Managed Wireless Solution

[its_sam]

We are in the process of obtaining quotes for a managed wireless solution to provide a 100% coverage to our School. I'm looking for reliable companies, preferably in the Hampshire area, that you have used in the past that would be able to help me out. If you could provide me with some good reasonably priced hardware (switchs, access points, etc) suitable for a School with approximately 500 students and 80 staff on role I would also be greatful.

 

Thanks in advance!

[Xirrus]

Hi Sam - As a vendor we have deployed in many schools in the Hampshire area. We are the only vendor to offer ae Free Real Life Site Survey and a 100% coverage guarantee. My details are below in my signature - please feel free to contact me so I can provide you with references and get you in touch with our guy who covers Hants.

 

Thanks

 

Ben

[nicholab]

You need 3 quotes and then you need to work with the supplier to build a solution. Make sure you get a cisco, meru and ruckus quotes. You should also look at near by schools and see what they have got. I have to say that mounting ap can be done by you or the site team.

[Edu-IT]

They're not local but will travel.

 

Home

[zag]

Don't forget a quote from a supplier for Aruba, great managed wireless system.

 

Had worked perfectly since the day it was installed and never touched it since.

[K.C.Leblanc]

Don't forget a quote from a supplier for Aruba, great managed wireless system.

 

Had worked perfectly since the day it was installed and never touched it since.

 

Same here, although our it took our supplier a long time to get it to work correctly. Our requirements weren't exectly straight forward.

[Haptic]

We are in the process of obtaining quotes for a managed wireless solution to provide a 100% coverage to our School. I'm looking for reliable companies, preferably in the Hampshire area, that you have used in the past that would be able to help me out. If you could provide me with some good reasonably priced hardware (switchs, access points, etc) suitable for a School with approximately 500 students and 80 staff on role I would also be greatful.

 

Thanks in advance!

 

Be sure to give me a shout for infomation on The Ruckus Wireless Managed Solution as this would be perfect for your situation,

We have supplied many edugeek members with this solution and I'm sure we can provide you with case studies to back up the reputation of this low cost and easy to deploy solution,

 

If you would like to ping me over your contact details by email I can get to work on this straight away for you,

 

[email protected]

Edited June 14, 2012 by Dos_Box

[neilmc]

Just something for thought, I had Xirrus come and give us a demo, and as much as they said that it was the best it failed misserably when we tested it. it wasn't untill they sent out a technician to come and fix the problems that we had that he informed us that the system that they where going to put in woudn't work for what we wanted to do.

 

I would say stay away from Xirrus and give Ruckus a try.

[Soulfish]

Just something for thought, I had Xirrus come and give us a demo, and as much as they said that it was the best it failed misserably when we tested it. it wasn't untill they sent out a technician to come and fix the problems that we had that he informed us that the system that they where going to put in woudn't work for what we wanted to do.

 

I would say stay away from Xirrus and give Ruckus a try.

Out of interest what was your use case, and why didn't Xirrus work? We're considering Ruckus and Xirrus (amongst others) so would be good to know what problems you found with Xirrus

[mickeyh080]

In the same situation so any more info would be most welcome

 

Out of interest what was your use case, and why didn't Xirrus work? We're considering Ruckus and Xirrus (amongst others) so would be good to know what problems you found with Xirrus

[Xirrus]

I'd also be fascinated to hear this - the only school in Lincoln I know that we had a unit in was fine once the array had been located correctly. Initially it was placed not in the location that was shown by our survey, but in a convenient location for testing. We then heard very little and were told it didn't work. I then visited and tested with an Array in the right location and proved coverage was excellent (even in an artroom, through 2 more 1930's heavy brick walls) but the decision was that there was no budget......

 

Thanks

 

Ben

[neilmc]

First let me say, this was my last school up north so not in lincolnshire.

 

Second the guy who came to give a site survey went on about how good xirrus was and how excellent the arrays worked, and when we came to test it for a month, he turned up with a 4 ap array instead of an 8, didn't have kit with him to install it in the correct place on the corridoor. after this was installed it took the logon time to anything between 10 minutes to 30 minutes.

 

a week later after numerous phone calls trying to get hold of the guy he finally sent out and engineer, who turned up and told us that the array he had installed wouldn't suite the corridoor even for a test, there where too many walls. he then informed us to get the full use of the 8 ap array we would have to upgrade our wireless cards in all laptops from b/g to n something the first guy didn't tell us about. even tho we specified we only had b and g, so from spending £30k on a wireless solution, with 8 ap in one array we where only going to get the use of 1 or 2 aps because we only had b/g if you had n wireless cards go for it should work nicely.

[Xirrus]

I know the exact site you are talking about and apologise if you feel this was a bad experience.

 

Firstly, we were informed that client devices were 802.11abg - there were 802.11a ap's in the network onsite which were not in use (although live) because when we investigated the client devices they were 802.11bg only. This means that to cover the number of clients in that one area there were 3 available channels (1,6,11).

 

We were also informed that the test was to only cover 2 classrooms hence why an XN4 was supplied. Once it was shown that we needed to cover the entire floor then we specified an XN8 which at the extremes of the entire floor provides an RSSI of -65db. Also the location of the cable run for the test was around 40ft away from the correct location.

 

Using b/g only the test was poor - as it was with 2 other manufacturers (including single channel architecture) because of the physics of the environment and number of clients.

 

The school has now purchased 802.11agn cards (PCMCIA) and we are testing again next week and expect to be very successful this time. Our networks are always designed to use a mix of clients for density situations as this is the only way to create more bandwidth. To create more bandwidth you need more radios. To have more non-interfering radios in the air you require use of the full wifi spectrum of 2.4ghz and 5ghz (802.11abgn).

 

We will test better than anyone else once the new clients are in place as we will be providing more available bandwidth.

 

Again I am sorry if you could not get hold of our guy, but we continue to work with the customer to create the correct solution for them.

 

In the interests of transparency I will post results of this testing (successful or unsuccessful) when it is completed.

 

Thanks

 

Ben

[featured_spectre]

Cant really ask for more than that! I would be interested to read the test results!

[Xirrus]

First let me say, this was my last school up north so not in lincolnshire.

 

BTW Neil, I believe you are at one of my 2 old schools as I went to school in the Market Rasen/Caistor area - I'd love the opportunity to come and talk to you about the Wifi if you would be gracious enough to let me.

 

Thanks

 

Ben

[ict_support]

Have a look at the Netgear WFS709TP it is licensed aruba kit (Aruba's Adaptive Radio Management (ARM) ) very good and fairly cheap for a managed wireless solution... Aruba license out there management software to a lot of the bigger players in the market. The downside with the Netgear solution is one controler will only control 16 APs however you can stack the controllers to control more APs. I think they are also bringing in an N specification range which will control more AP's per controller.

[riskyburden]

Get a quote for Trapeze Networks kit, I've got it here and it works a treat all POE access points the Ringmaster software that controls the wireless makes it easy to setup and manage etc. Not sure about the cost mind.

[_BC_]

The company that installed our wireless are based near Basingstoke, they came out and did a live survey of our building and then did a great job of installing the AP's and setting everything up. When it was done they did another survey to ensure that we had the 100% coverage that we wanted.

 

The Trapeze Wireless allows us to have multiple SSID's, we have one for allowing the staff to have secure access, one for wireless voice and one for guests. The guests SSID uses a great peice of software, called SmartPass, that allows us to create users (without having to add them to AD) that have specific limits on the times that they can use the wireless network for and when that time expires, they get automatically removed from the network.

 

Our wireless voice SSID is locally switched, that means that all the traffic does not get sent back to the wireless controller. It gets placed directly on the VLAN, which reduces latency. Thus improving the quality of the voice call.

 

Our secure staff SSID uses bonded 802.1x authentication, which im sure you're all aware is currently the most secure method for allowing wireless access, as both the user and the laptop have got to be authenticated.

 

PM me if you would like me to forward you some contact information.

[mhowell]

Hi Sam,

Hopefully you've considered Meru, I think we have upwards of 50 schools in the Hampshire / Dorset area. We have 3 VERY reliable suppliers in the area who have supply into Hants/Dorset, we are bound to have a reference nearby you can go and see or talk to.

Meru is know for its abilities in solving the usual issues of channel interference, roaming issues, and client density. The following case study is a 1700 student Hampshire school

Meru Networks | Brune Park

 

And if you really want to see the power of what we can really do have a look at the following:

 

Good luck, research hard as wireless is fraught with issues in a school environment.

[Wes]

Meru offers a single channel architecture, which is positioned as eliminating the apparent co-channel interference issues that other multi-channel wireless systems are dogged with (the other 97% of all non-meru wireless systems apparently don't work). Some other vendors (Bzzzzz) offers auto channel selection which eliminates any problems with co-channel interference.

 

Also Meru will need to be 100% certain that no neighboruing wireless is using the same channel, otherwise the whole deplyment will need to be re-configured to another channel.

 

In my opinions Meru does a bad job with high density cleints as it means you need to open up more channels to support more devices. In the 5Ghz spectrum there are 19 channels - why not use them? It's like opening up just one lane on the M25.

 

Scaling with Meru is difficult, each AP having just two radios means any more than 2 channels requires another set of APs.

 

Roaming is achieved with the virtual port functionality within the Air Traffic Control software where a virtual AP follows a client accorss physical APs. There is however 802.311r which defined fast roaming and is incorporated in the Voice Enterprise certification announced by the WiFi alliance which will leave Meru's approach overshadowed.

 

I'm certain Meru works though, I have seen it. But I would question that it is the most forward looking solution out there and in my experience is also quite expensive, certainly at the controller end. Some vendors have eliminated the controller which makes for a much simpler, more scalable and lower cost deployment whilst offering the same or better functions and features. Bee sure you're making the right choice. Bzzzzzz.

[tommej]

+1 for aruba

[JCrosse]

Please don't regard this as an attack, more as a reply to some of your comments based on my own knowledge and experience.

 

Meru offers a single channel architecture, which is positioned as eliminating the apparent co-channel interference issues that other multi-channel wireless systems are dogged with (the other 97% of all non-meru wireless systems apparently don't work). Some other vendors (Bzzzzz) offers auto channel selection which eliminates any problems with co-channel interference.

I have experience of installing and configuring wireless solutions from many vendors (HP, Netgear, Cisco, 3Com, Meru) as well as supporting others such as Rukus, Aruba etc. Most of these are centrally managed controller based solutions and all which support auto channel selection and auto transmit power adjustment. The fact still remains that there are limited non-overlapping RF channels that can be used in any wireless deployment. If to many access points can see each other then auto hopping channels will make no difference. The only solution the is to auto adjust the transmit power. When the power is reduced so to is the signal strength leaving coverage black spots.

This matter is complicated further when taking into account 802.11n and the spiky and erratic nature of the coverage patterns produced by 802.11n. Also the way 802.11n signals bounce around walls, objects and other obstacles means that something as simple as moving furniture in a room can effect the signal pattern and as a result power and channel selection.

 

Also Meru will need to be 100% certain that no neighbouring wireless is using the same channel, otherwise the whole deplyment will need to be re-configured to another channel.

This would need to be taken into account with any wireless deployment as would other sources or RF interference, As for changing channels of a whole deployment, this would be a single setting that needed changing on a controller and would probably take around 2mins. This would be considerable less than replanning a conventional wireless deployment if a neighbouring building were to add interfering wireless post deployment.

 

In my opinions Meru does a bad job with high density cleints as it means you need to open up more channels to support more devices. In the 5Ghz spectrum there are 19 channels - why not use them? It's like opening up just one lane on the M25.

Scaling with Meru is difficult, each AP having just two radios means any more than 2 channels requires another set of APs.

Couldn't agree more, but in a conventional wireless deployment the clients would merely connect to the AP broadcasting with the best signal strength and so the same channel. You can of course with most wireless systems configure load balancing but Meru's and other (4th gen) single channel architecture allows you to layer RF networks without interference meaning handling of client density (when configured correctly) should be greatly improved. When more devices are added an extra AP can simply be added and configured to load balance without the need to reconfigure channels or move existing APs.

 

Roaming is achieved with the virtual port functionality within the Air Traffic Control software where a virtual AP follows a client accorss physical APs. There is however 802.311r which defined fast roaming and is incorporated in the Voice Enterprise certification announced by the WiFi alliance which will leave Meru's approach overshadowed.

My understanding is that roaming benefits of a Virutal cell Wireless system are more a handy by-product and not designed to compete against 802.11r standards?

also i would refer you to what other vendors are saying about the technology. here's a quote taken from Aruba's own website

"802.11r is a new standard, intended to improve handover performance. In centralised WLAN architectures such as Aruba’s it offers only limited improvements, particularly if opportunistic key caching is used (see above). But 802.11r support should be on the checklist for the WLAN vendor."

 

I'm certain Meru works though, I have seen it. But I would question that it is the most forward looking solution out there and in my experience is also quite expensive, certainly at the controller end. Some vendors have eliminated the controller which makes for a much simpler, more scalable and lower cost deployment whilst offering the same or better functions and features. Bee sure you're making the right choice. Bzzzzzz.

Nobody can deny that there are some key differences between Meru's wireless technology and others on the market. There are also some which are similar. But is it a bad thing to take a different approach to a problem. If Vendors don't come up with new ways to tackle problems then you simply end up with the same products being released over and over by every vendor, with each competing by trying to add new gimmicks and features instead of looking at their existing products and addressing why the problems are there in the first place. As for cost, I would not say that Meru equipment is cheap. It is considerable more expensive than some of the alternatives. They are however cheaper than some of the equivalent competition. Try getting some like for like comparisons with vendors such as HP or Cisco names which are trusted and known particularly in the commercial sector and there prices will suddenly seem much more reasonable.

A Final consideration is that best value does not always equal cheapest. Other factors such as quality should be taken into consideration.

[intheknow]

Post edited due to unauthorised advertising.

 

Dos_Box

Edited August 2, 2010 by Dos_Box

[ryman]

Post edited due to unauthorised advertising.

 

Dos_Box

Edited August 2, 2010 by Dos_Box

[Arthur]

Does anyone have any experience of managed wireless solutions from Extricom? If so, how does it compare to the competition?